7^th International Conference on
Smart Materials and Nanotechnology (Webinar)

Biography:

Prof Dr Katrin S. Lips is an expert in analyzing the cellular compatibility of new implants and bone substitute materials and investigates signaling pathways in the musculoskeletal system. She is the head of the Experimental Trauma Surgery at the University of Giessen where several animal models and in-vitro system are established that allow the investigation of new implants with suitable cell and molecular biological methods. The Experimental Trauma Surgery is connected with the Clinic of Trauma, Hand and Reconstructive Surgery at the University Hospital of Giessen-Marburg Campus Giessen and uses core facilities of the University of Giessen to improve the methodical repertoire with radiological, physical, chemical, and immunological methods.

Abstract:

Introduction: Fragile bone with altered microarchitecture and increased fracture incidence is characteristic for osteoporosis. Failure of implant fixation and low osteoinductivity raises the quest for new supporting bone substitute materials. Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) is a growth factor that enhances in vitro the vitality of bone forming osteoblasts but not bone resorption by osteoclasts. Here, we asked whether integration of BDNF into pasty calcium phosphate cement (pCPC) via coating of mesoporous bioglas particles (MBG) is able to stimulate fracture healing in a murine osteoporosis model. Methodology: Female 16-week-old muscarinic acetylcholine receptor M3 knockout mice (M3KO) and their corresponding wild type mice (WT) were used as osteoporosis model and underwent osteotomy and implantation of a mixture of BDNF functionalized MBG and pCPC (pCPC+MBG+BDNF). After a post-operational duration of 35 days, femurs were extracted and analyzed. Findings: The implants were well-integrated into the fracture gap and showed a good biocompatibility. We observed the dissolution of MBG after reaching the implant interface by forming pores that were subsequently filled with new built yet not mineralized bone. An increase of new built bone was found in fracture gap and at implant interface of WT treated with pCPC+MBG+BDNF compared to the group without BDNF. The non-operated contralateral femur of M3KO showed signs of bone loss compared to the contralateral femur of WT mice. After application of BDNF the bone loss in M3KO was reversed. Additionally, we measured a decrease in number of leucocytes in M3KO with pCPC+MBG+BDNF compared to without BDNF. Conclusion: The new BDNF containing implant was able to enhance bone formation in WT mice. In M3KO mice, BDNF stimulated the reversion of bone loss and was involved in the regulation of immune cells. Thus, BDNF is suitable for functionalization of bone substitute materials and treatment of osteoporotic fractures.

Biography:

Surita Basu is doing her Ph.D in “Patterning in Thin Film’ from Indian Institute of Technology Delhi. The work extensively involves fabrication of thin film and create instability on the surface of the film to undergo spontaneous self-organization of the film to form patterns on the surface. Another part of the research involves pattern directed self-assembly of nanoparticles over the patterned thin film. She has done her B.Tech in Polymer Science & Technology from Calcutta University and M.Tech in Nanoscience & Technology from Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University. She has worked in various industries for 5 years. She has three publication in reputed international journals and had attended various International and national conferences.

Abstract:

The fabrication of finite arrangement with nanoscale materials is key to current technology and self-assembly and self-organization is considered an efficient and cost-effective and so a preferred process for building ordered structure of nano particles. Carbon nanotubes are very interesting material for its properties and molecular structures. Carbon nanotubes can assemble in different morphologies depending on its physical synthesis method. The different morphologies of CNT are coiled CNTs, CNT junctions and toroidal CNTs. Thin polymer film < 100 nm also undergoes self-organization resulting in formation of arrays of droplets. These spontaneously formed ordered patterns or structures on the surface has wide range of technological applications. The retraction of fluid from the surface that it was supposed to cover leads to the phenomenon of dewetting causing the arrangement of droplets which  act as a template for the self-assembly of the  carbon nanotubes. The self-organized patterns on the thin PS film along with Marangoni flow is the driving force behind the circular ring formation of the carbon nanotubes without any external physical method. Toroidal or circular ring carbon nanotubes are unique structure of interesting properties. These surface structures can be of great use in biomedical purposes like skin grafting, sensors, superhydrophobic coating and others.

Biography:

Emilija Zdraveva, PhD, is postdoc at the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Textile Technology. Her research interests concern electrospinning, with focus on the development of electrospun materials for heat energy storage based on phase change materials and development of electrospun scaffolds for in vitro cells culture. She received her PhD degree in Textile Science and Technology in 2015 at the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Textile Technology, her Master degree in Textile Engineering at Ghent University, Belgium in 2009 and her Bachelor degree in Textile Technology at the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Textile Technology in 2006. As a PhD candidate she was working at Deakin University, Institute for Frontier Materials in Geelong, Australia in 2013, 2014 and 2015 in the Nanofibers group, Lab of electrospinning. She has over 40 publications and is currently involved in a Croatian Science Foundation project: Custom Tailored Fibrous Scaffold Prototype for Tissue Cells Culture via Combined Electrospinning.

Abstract:

Nanofibers fabrication nowadays has become unimaginable without mentioning or research involving the technique of electrospinning. Due to the vast possibilities that this technique offers in regard to nanofibers morphology, nanofibrous structures architecture and application prospective, it has become the main interest of many scientists with various expertise profiles. Electrospun nanofibers are advantageous over conventional fibers due to their lightweight, high surface-to-volume ratio, adjustable fiber diameter/morphology, and well-controlled functionality. This presentation will cover the principle of electrospinning and device configurations including needle, bi-component, needleless, nanoyarn electrospinning and melt electrospinning. A highlight will be given to the last decades nanofibers device productivity increase, starting from the first collector modifications up to the innovative needleless design leading towards industrialization of the technique. The talk will further focus on the possibilities of nanofibers functionalization towards specific application fields including: energy/electronics: i.e. energy storage (supercapacitors and batteries), energy conversion (solar cells and piezoelectric materials) and sensors; biomedicine: i.e. tissue engineering scaffolds, drug delivery systems and implants; environmental protection: i.e. air and water filtration; chemistry: i.e. catalysts; functional textiles: i.e. protective clothing (e.g. protection against heat, chemical agents protection), superhydrophobic and superhydrophilic materials, materials with directional water transfer, water collection materials etc.; other application fields: acoustic insulation, composite reinforcements etc. Special insight in regard to nanofibrous applications will be given to smart nanofibers example studies such as: on-off switch drug release systems, tumor cells detectors, tissues cells mechanical-electrical energy conversion, smart nanogenerators etc. In overall the presentation will highlight the huge potential of these advanced nanofibrous materials in different application areas that can improve human life in many ways.   

Biography:

Dr. Abhijit Ray is an Associate Professor at the Pandit Deendayal Petroleum University, India and currently heading the Department of Solar Energy. After completing his PhD in 2003, he was post-doctoral researcher at Variable Energy Cyclotron Center of Department of Atomic Energy (India). In 2004 he joined Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra as Lecturer in Physics before joining PDPU as Assistant Professor in 2007. He has been visiting professor at Nagoya Institute of Technology, Japan during 2015-16. His current research works are focused to the development of earth-abundant and eco-friendly semiconducting thin films, nanostructures and devices for photovoltaic, photo-electrochemical energy conversions and capacitive energy storage applications. He has been principle investigator in various externally funded research projects from DRDO, DST and MNRE; published more than 75 papers in peer reviewed journals and filed three Indian patents.

Abstract:

Use of the solar radiation in conjunction with heterogeneous semiconductor photocatalysts is one of the alternative approaches in the purification of industrial wastewater containing dye and toxic metal ions. Photocatalytic properties of various inexpensive and chemically stable semiconductors, including Cu₂O, ZnO, SnS, gC₃N₄, BiOCl etc in their nanostructured forms have been found to be efficient materials with potential in water purification technologies. Their nano-carbon composites, with Graphene or reduced Graphene oxides have shown reasonable efficacy of industrial wastewater treatment through size and shape modulation effect of the catalysts by the virtue of effective electron transfer channel provided by the 2D material. Graphene being also capable of non-porous surface adsorption and an adsorption facilitated by p-p interaction has been used in a reduced graphene oxide hydrogel (rGOh) form along with the visible light responsive semiconductors in the treatment process.  Nanostructured BiOCl prepared in hydrothermal route with nano-morphological variations and non-metal doped gC₃N₄ are used as the visible light responsive photocatalysts (vlsPC) in the reduction of heavy metal ions Hg²⁺, Pb²⁺ and Cr⁴⁺ as well as in the removal of two potential textile industry dyes, Rhodamine B and Methylene blue. The adsorption-photocatalytic performance of rGOh/vlsPCs shows that heavy ion concentration is reduced below 40% in about 90 minutes of irradiation by simulated solar light. Dyes play a combined role of sensitizer and pollutant. Photoluminescence absorption spectra suggest that the dye-chromophores undergo cleavage in the visible photon energy range of 450-600nm. The developed graphene supported photocatalysts have been successfully tested with industrial effluent water samples as well under natural solar irradiation. A detailed optimization of such system is underway.

Biography:

Dr Pati has his expertise in synthesis, characterization and evaluation of the properties of nanocrystalline materials used in energy applications.  He has completed his PhD from Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur and worked as a scientist at the Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at the University of Maryland.  Dr Pati’s research area is mainly on different kinds of fuel cell materials and his group is working on new materials which are used at low temperature SOFC. 

Abstract:

Solid oxide fuel cells are a class of an electrochemical conversion device characterized by the use of a solid oxide material as the electrolyte.  The use a solid oxide electrolyte in SOFCs is to conduct negative oxygen ions from cathode to anode. The electrochemical oxidation of the oxygen ions with hydrogen or carbon monoxide thus occurs on the anode side.  SOFCs operate at very high temperatures, typically between 800 and 1000 °C.  At these temperatures, SOFCs do not require expensive catalyst materials, as is currently necessary for lower-temperature fuel cells such as PEMFC. Although impressive progress has been made in the development of alternative anode materials with mixed conducting properties, Ni/YSZ continues to be the most sought for high temperature SOFC applications so far.  Despite of its poor carburization and sulfidation capabilities during the operation of SOFC directly on hydrocarbons, Ni/YSZ continues to be the most widely used anode electrode material because of its high catalytic activity for hydrogen oxidation, hydrocarbon reforming, high electronic and ionic conductivity and durability.  The present study explains the effect of ceria incorporation into Ni/YSZ cermet anode layers on the performance of button-cell solid oxide fuel cells operating with n-butane/steam fuel feeds.  A series of Ni/CeO₂/YSZ Anode materials were prepared by changing the metal ion concentration.  The materials were characterized by powder XRD, and HRTEM.  The electrochemical performance was tested at realistic condition on a single cell SOFC.  Comparison of the performance with and without the ceria indicated improvements for operation with doped ceria for direct n-butane/steam feeds.  For initial cell performance, ceria addition to the anode materials offered improved performance with higher power densities using n-butane suggesting that ceria may enhance water-gas-shift reactions and thereby increase H₂ availability for more effective electrochemical oxidation in the anode layer.

Biography:

I Khushbu Gupta has expertise in biological synthesis of nanoparticles and their various applications.  I am pursuing my PhD in applied sciences from The NorthCap University. I have done my M.Tech in Biotechnology. I have keen interest in biotechnology and aim is to develop some biological productsfor the betterment of society using my knowledge.

Abstract:

In the immediate study, the extract of fungus Fusarium oxysporum was used for the production of platinum nanoparticles. The biologically produced nanoparticles were characterized by UV-Vis Spectroscopy, FTIR, powder XRD and SEM. FTIR results recognize the bioactive functional groups responsible for the reduction of hexachloroplatinic acid into platinum nanoparticles. XRD pattern revealed that the nanoparticles were crystalline and have face-centered cubic (fcc) geometry with average size of 25nm.  The morphology of biologically synthesized platinum nanoparticles was determined by SEM micrographs. The synthesized platinum nanoparticles were further examined for photocatalytic and biological activity such as antioxidant and antimicrobial activity against both bacteria and fungus. PtNps shows maximum degradation of methyl orange indicates their application in waste water treatment. The zone of inhibition against microbes was studied in accordance with the method of agar well diffusion and agar dilution method was helpful in determining the minimum inhibitory concentration of PtNps. The minimum inhibitory concentration of PtNps was found to be 62.5µg/ml against E.Coli, which is quite better than that of commercially available drug ampicillin. The antioxidant activity was studied by DPPH method and platinum nanoparticles shows 79% of scavenging activity.

Biography:

Abstract:

Perovskite thin film solar cells have experienced astonishing efficiency improvements from 2.2% to above 22% in recent years. The high efficiency, ease and low embodied energy fabrication and the band gap tunability make it promising as the next generation of low cost photovoltaic devices and in the application of tandem solar cells with even higher efficiencies. Here, an effective additive CsI is incorporated into the CsPbI₂Br perovskite solar cell. As a result CsI particles penetrate into the holes of the CsPbI₂Br lattice during the growth process leading to suppressed nucleation and led to the extraction of the high efficiency charge and suppressed the recombination of the carrier. Consequently, the sample cells showed a relatively high PCE of 15.54% and an excellent FF of 79.37%. More importantly, the Perovskite solar cells unencapsulated with the layers of the CSI interface showed remarkable stability by retaining 90% of the initial power conversion efficiency with thermal treatment at 80 ° C for 135 minutes in ambient air, 75% of the power conversion efficiency initial under illumination continues for 90 minutes in the ambient air and 89% of the initial power conversion efficiency after being placed in the nitrogen glove-box for 45 days.

Biography:

Dr von Gratowski has her expertise in research in nanotechnology, nano-manipulation, nano-assembling, shape memory alloys. She has had invented and suggested frontier mechanical bottom up nano-assembling, nano-manufacturing and nano-fabrication of single nanodevices based on individual nano-objects using the smallest and the fastest shape memory alloy nanogripper. This technology opens up perspective of the creation of single nano/micro and macro devices from individual nanotubes, nanowires and other nano-objects. Mechanical bottom up nano assembling is going to overcome the presently existing barrier of the integration of variety of nanoobjects and nanodevices with each other and with convectional integrated circuits. Moreover, the novel technology will provide products not only with the next level high quality, but also extremely low cost. This breakthrough nanotechnology will be affordable for small groups with small modest budget in science, education and SME.

Abstract:

Nowadays many different types of nano-sized materials, like nanoparticles and nanostructures, especially 1D-nanotubes, nanowires (NWs), 2D-nanomaterials such as graphene etc. have been discovered and intensively studied. Nanomaterials as the bulk materials and also as single nanoobjects demonstrate the unique functional properties. Functional properties of single nanoobjects allowing to design many individual nanodevices based on single nanoobjects. Recently, many investigations have led to a wide range of proofs of the concept of individual nanoscale devices designed using single nanoobjects. Those individual nanodevices include NWs- and CNTs-based nano-sensors, FET, nanolasers, etc. Such single nanodevices represent attractive building blocks for a hierarchical assembly of micro/macrodevices. The bottleneck of the design of such nano/micro/macrodevices is missing of the technology for the creating and such single nanodevices and a hierarchical assembly of micro/macrodevices from those individual nanodevices.

 The report suggests frontier nanotechnology for the hierarchical assembling of           nano/micro/macroscopic functional devices using individual nanoscale building blocks.     There are 5 main steps in this “bottom-up” approach for the production of nanodevices:   1)  to tailor nanomaterials; 2) to worked out the surface of the nanomaterial; 3) cut   nanomaterials into individual components; 4) to organize these  components into   nanodevices; 5) to interconnect and unite single nanodevices together in micro/macro   World. The last 4th and 5th steps are still challenge in modern nanotechnology. In the   present report the prospective applications of the new 3D nanomanipulation system based   on the smallest and fastest in the World shape memory nanogrippers is discussed. This   design system is experimentally proved to provide 3D manipulation of the real nano-     objects like NW, grafene etc. In the report it is shown that this type of nanomanipulation   can be used for nanomanufacturing of nano/microdevices, using alternative “bottom-up”  mechanical nano-assembly. This breakthrough technology pretends in many cases to compete the manufacturing approaches based on expensive currently available “topdown” nanolithography